Coming soon - We accept credit cards!

Part of the process of setting up our business was acquiring a business credit card.  Along with that we raised the question of our business being able to accept credit cards from customers.  Our initial inquiries gave us answers we didn't really want. We found out we would have to pay a fee to rent the machine to slide people's cards in, pay a per transaction fee, pay a monthly fee to be able to accept credit cards, and pay a fee to keep the whole process secure.  And for our little business with only two guest rooms, it didn't seem worth all the fees.  Plus, we were told that we couldn't use the cute little card readers that connect to iPhones or iPads because our business was lodging.  (What's that got to do with anything?)

So now a year later, we, along with our customers, have all survived our need to accept only cash or checks.  But it was touch-and-go at times.  One customer forgot and mailed us a check after they got home, but I could tell from the check that it was some kind of counter check from their bank.  And I cringed a little every time I had to tell potential guests that we don't accept credit cards, especially if they were 35 or under - an age group that hardly ever uses checks anymore.  If they forgot, I knew we always had one ATM in town, but only if The Store was open.  So, I was always on the lookout for a solution.

And here it is:

Every time I opened up my QuickBooks computer program to do some B&B business, I was met with a screen taunting me about using credit cards for our business.  I finally called the 800-number and talked to a nice young man who explained about Intuit's pay-as-you-go plan and how it could work for us, even though we are lodging.  Turns out, the rule--or law--says that we can't accept a credit charge for more than 90 days in advance, so as long as we stay within that time frame, we can accept credit cards.  YAY!  The pay-as-you-go plan was super cheap and the charge data goes through wifi directly into our QuickBooks program.  Sweet!

Of course there was one last glitch - this only works when using QuickBooks 2014 and we are using 2013.  But a lucky St. Patrick's Day discount yesterday enabled us to buy it at a greatly reduced price, so we are almost good to go.  

I suppose that means anything we saved by moving to this service for people was eaten up by the purchase of the new software.

(Sigh - again...)